


Good Mornings & Diet Coke

by missmichellebelle



Category: Glee RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Different First Meeting, Alternate Universe - Office, General, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-23
Updated: 2013-05-23
Packaged: 2017-12-12 17:45:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/814249
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missmichellebelle/pseuds/missmichellebelle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After two years of keeping to himself, he has someone who wants to go out to lunch with him, who walks with him to the bus stop after work every day, and who says good morning with a smile and a Diet Coke.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Good Mornings & Diet Coke

**Author's Note:**

> Written for CCAUW.

It wasn't supposed to be a long term thing. It was a temp thing, just something easy that didn't require many qualifications, and involved little (if no) social skills. For someone like Chris, who's never had the luxury of finishing college or the ability to interact easily with other people, it was the perfect way to put money in his pocket when he needed it. But that's the only thing it was ever supposed to be.

Over two years later, and Chris is still there. He still sits behind a desk, in a cubicle, dressed in business formal despite the fact that he never sees or talks to anyone, staring at spreadsheets and sending memos and not really knowing how it happened. He's supposed to be a writer, and there's a book somewhere in his life, spread through emails and notebooks and documents saved somewhere on his laptop. Even if he had the motivation to put it all together, it would still be a super, _super_ rough draft, and he just… Doesn't have it.

Chris has a dream, or had one, and it's been wrapped up and stifled by a stable job, with a stable salary, and the security of a place to live and a way to feed himself.

It's not the life he'd ever planned, or wanted. It's a cycle, a routine, and a monotonous one that Chris doesn't know how to start breaking away from.

*

People come and go from the office so regularly that Chris hardly knows anyone's name, even after working so long. There are a few people, and he recognizes them, but he doesn't really have friends at work.

If someone new suddenly appears in the office, Chris doesn't think much of it. He pushes his glasses up his nose, rolls his neck, and goes back to the data report glaring at him from his computer screen, ready to be absorbed until he can shut everything down and go back to his apartment for the day.

So when there's suddenly a coffee on his desk one day, jerking Chris to attention with the clink of ceramic against laminate, it's an understatement that Chris is surprised. He stares at it, aware of the presence hovering by his shoulder, and then turns to look at the person standing there. The _guy_ standing there, with a kind smile and bright eyes, and that, more than anything else, tells Chris that he's new.

Chris doesn't even remember the last time he _felt_ that much life running through him, much less showed it so easily. Then again, maybe he never has.

"Hi!" Even the guy's voice sounds enthusiastic. Chris blinks at him, feeling tired and slightly jarred. His wrists hurt, and he uses his brief break to roll and crack them. "I'm Darren, I just started today." The guy—Darren, apparently—holds out his hand, and Chris reaches for it, no strength in his grip.

"Chris," he responds simply, and then turns in his chair to get back to work. Because there isn't really much more to say.

Or, so Chris _thought_.

"I brought you coffee," Darren goes on, as if Chris hadn't seen the cup.

Chris doesn't like coffee, at least not _drip_ coffee, but he drinks it because, well… He doesn't really have a choice. He'd tried, at first, to keep his own stock of Diet Cokes in the break room fridge, but it had proved pointless very quickly. So Chris drinks the coffee, because it's there and it's free and it helps him get through the day. He never, ever drinks it because he wants to.

He doesn't say anything, but something must show on his face, because Darren's smile falters.

"Do you not… Like coffee? I just sort of figured—"

"It's fine." Chris gives him a terse smile in response. "It's not my favorite thing, but it does its job."

"Keeps you awake?" Darren suggests, and Chris snorts a laugh.

"Basically." And this is where the conversation is supposed to end.

But it doesn't.

"So what is your favorite thing?" Darren is perched on the wall of his cubicle now, arms folded, eyebrows raised. He's wearing glasses, too—thicker, larger frames. _Fashionable_ , Chris thinks. Much more than the wire-rimmed ones he chooses to wear.

"Um." Chris looks back at his computer screen, frowning at the spreadsheet but knowing he won't be able to fill it out correctly while also trying to hold a conversation. Why is he trying to hold a conversation? "Diet Coke, if I have the choice for my caffeine fix." There's a machine in the break room, but it's not free and Chris rather use the money for something else. Unless it's a bad day. Bad days are impossible to get through without one.

"So—"

"Don't you… Have work you're supposed to be doing?" Chris furrows his eyebrows, realizing his voice probably came out a bit sharper than he'd intended judging by the surprised look on Darren's face.

"Oh, uh, I… Yeah. Just." Darren shrugs. "I guess I expected to be working with a bunch of people twenty years older than me, so when I saw you, I was… Curious, I guess."

Chris looks away, feeling a bitter taste in the back of his throat. He turns back to his computer monitor, fingers poised over the keyboard. Because he knows he's young, that he shouldn't be here, and he doesn't need to be reminded of it.

"…hey, look, I'm—"

"Thank you for the coffee," Chris cuts him off, voice emotionless and final. Darren must be able to tell that the conversation is over, because Chris hears his retreating footsteps against the carpet. There's something about the whole exchange that doesn't sit right with him, but he doesn't think too much on it. After all, he has work to do.

*

When Chris comes into work the next morning, he's surprised to see a six pack of sweating Diet Coke sitting on his desk. He stares at it in surprise, not looking away from it as he sets down his bag and boots up his computer. There's a folded up post-it note sitting on top, the paper transparent where water droplets have soaked through. When he opens it, he reads, _sorry if I offended you_ written in unfamiliar scrawl, a smiley face doodled after it.

Chris lets out a surprised little laugh, and when he looks up and around, he catches Darren's eyes as he walks past. He gives a little smile, and a little wave, and… Chris actually returns it.

*

Before long, Chris does have a work friend. Well, Chris has _Darren_. But it still counts, and it's certainly more of a relationship than he'd ever thought he'd have with anyone else in the office. After two years of keeping to himself, he has someone who wants to go out to lunch with him, who walks with him to the bus stop after work every day, and who says good morning with a smile and a Diet Coke.

It's… Different. After two years of things being almost completely the same, it's a change in Chris's schedule. He starts getting up a little earlier in the mornings, thinking more about what he wears and actually styling his hair a little bit. Not for Darren, because that would be _ridiculous_ , but because Darren likes to go out to eat and Chris doesn't want random people seeing him with limp hair and old shirts.

"You did your hair," Darren comments, the first day he notices, grinning over his morning coffee (a little milk and _four_ packets of sugar) while he hands Chris a soda. Chris should probably stop accepting them at some point, but he can't bring himself to do it just yet.

"Uh, yeah. I do that sometimes." Not in a long time. Maybe the last time Chris went out on a date, which was… Well, too long ago, really. He averts his attention to his soda.

"I like it." Darren mimes a sweep over his own hair, and nods, approvingly, and Chris smiles into the can of Diet Coke. It means he can't hit the snooze button on his alarm anymore, but it's a sacrifice that proves worth it.

*

"I'm a musician," Darren tells him over noodles one particular lunch period. "But it's not exactly lucrative, so that's how I ended up with this job. A degree in acting doesn't actually get you very far in the world, it turns out."

Chris wants to say, _it gets you further than no degree_.

He wants to say, _no, get out while you still can_.

He wants to say, _that's all this was for me, too, at the beginning, and now suddenly it's my whole life_.

But he doesn't.

"What do you play?" He asks, instead, glaring at the ease with which Darren wields his chopsticks and trying his best to mimic the motions.

"Uh… Guitar, piano, drums, violin, ce—"

"Okay, okay, I get it." Chris holds up a chopstick as if to stop him. "You take the title of musician very seriously."

"As one does," Darren replies, voice solemn, and Chris rolls his eyes as he sticks a bite of noodles in his mouth. He really hopes Darren doesn't end up in the same trap he did.

*

Then they aren't work friends. Then they're _actual_ friends. It starts when Darren just randomly invites Chris over for pizza on a Wednesday night, and Chris had already complained about his boring evening and had no reason to get out of it.

Then it becomes a thing. Every Wednesday, they end up getting pizza—eating out, picking up, or having it delivered to one of their apartments. Darren shares with three roommates, so his place is bigger, but Chris it's just… Well, just him and his cat. So, more often than not, they end up there.

Chris doesn't even have time to really question it, because it just becomes part of the routine. Slowly and surely, Darren has wheedled his way into every part of Chris's life, and it's hard for Chris to think that just a few months ago that hadn't been the case at all.

For Chris's 21st, Darren tries to talk him into going out and getting wasted, but Chris insures him that he really just wants to go home and get in his pajamas—the party scene has never been his thing, after all.

"Alright," Darren says. "Then we'll get wasted at your place and you can hang out in your pajamas."

It isn't exactly what Chris had planned, but… Well, nothing really goes the way Chris has planned, not with Darren involved.

Then again, Darren actually seems to know what he's doing as far as mixing drinks go. Chris knows he probably would have taken a few shots and then curled up with Brian while watching movies, but instead he's sitting on his couch with Darren and drinking something delicious that makes him feel a little giggly and loose lipped.

"Life wasn't supposed to be this way," he starts telling Darren. He's only had one drink, and he's working on his second, but the alcohol is enough to weaken his defenses and let things leak through. Darren's still on his first, and he looks at Chris in interest, but doesn't say anything. "I… I wanted to be a writer, but you can't really… Live off that. Not at first. Maybe not ever."

"What happened?" Darren asks, softly, and Chris frowns deeply.

"I just… Didn't. I don't even know. I stopped wanting to write, got lost in the everyday clock work of life, and just—" Chris flares his fingers out, like he's miming an explosion. "Gone."

"I don't believe that," Darren says, after a few moments. Chris stares at him. "You just… Lost it for awhile, man. Like writer's block. It happens when I try to write music sometimes." Darren isn't looking at him, eyes trained at the ceiling as he talks. "But it's not gone. Just buried. Just need to find it again."

Chris continues to stare at Darren, who finally tilts his chin down and meets his gaze. His eyes and his smile are warm, hitting Chris a little harder with all the alcohol in his system (what the _fuck_ did Darren put in this drink?).

"I can help, if you want."

"Why do you believe in me so much?" Chris whispers, because it doesn't make sense.

"Because the second I saw you sitting in a cubicle, I knew you didn't belong there." Darren takes a swig of his drink. "You believe in fate?"

"No," Chris answers immediately, and Darren laughs.

"Well, I do." He grins at Chris. "I could have gotten a job at like, a hundred different places, but I got one in the same office where you were working. I think that's fate." Darren looks contemplative for a second. "Like. Maybe I'm supposed to help you find it again."

"…are you always this philosophical when you drink?"

"Basically." Darren doesn't miss a beat. "But I do mean it."

"Then tell me again when I'm sober." Is Chris not sober? He feels a little not sober. He scoots along the couch until he ends up pressed into Darren's side. He shouldn't be there, but he wants to be, and he doesn't think much else of it at the moment. Darren is warm, and Chris's body feels loose. Also cuddly. He feels strangely cuddly.

But Darren just lifts his arm and pulls him closer.

"Sure thing. Every day, if you need me to."

"Don't need anybody," Chris murmurs, and he feels Darren's cheek press against the top of his head.

"Liar."

 _No_ , but Chris doesn't say it. He's not lying. He doesn't need anybody, and he doesn't need Darren.

It doesn't mean he doesn't want him, though.


End file.
